And she would… what? Live here? Was that possible? Could she abandon every aspect of her former life? Would she stay here?
It seemed like a dream, and yet that was exactly what made her suddenly afraid of it. When things are too good to be true, she reminded herself, they are.
Was it not a belief in too-good-to-be-true things that had caused all of her life’s sorrows? Her brother-in-law had been too good to be true, and he was; he had betrayed her to get to her sister, and her sister had betrayed her as well. The life on Callia-14 had seemed too good to be true, and it was; it was a scheme to colonize a moon that no one would ever want to live on, and that was why any of this was taking place at all.
Would she never learn? That was the question that she inevitably ended up asking herself.
But surely this was different. Surely, she had not gotten it all wrong, as she always did.
* * *
She was never sure why she crept up on them. Maybe it was, ultimately, a survival instinct, still smoldering inside of her. They were standing in the gardens when she spotted them, and they seemed involved in a ritual at first, because they stood motionless with their heads bowed in front of the great chasm that served as a monument.
She walked through a part of the garden area that was almost like a forest, at first in order to give them time to finish whatever they were doing. She was sidetracked for a bit by the sight of a beautiful tree, one that reminded her of a rare tree on Earth that had nearly gone extinct. The leaves were a different shape and a hue of sea-colored green that no plant on earth possessed, but the bark was white and the small leaves fluttered in the slightest breeze, making a sound that she delighted in.
Mozok and Voso were still there when she rounded a bend that led up to the monument, but she could faintly hear that they were speaking. She couldn’t hear their words, but it did not have the cadence of a prayer or a chant, but rather an intense discussion.
And that was why she crept toward them. A gut instinct, a feeling that something must be off. The paranoia that she had honed for so long blossomed furiously in her chest.
She stood behind a leafy hedge and strained to hear them over the cascading water. They were speaking a mix of Draquun and Herstrakaa, which took her several moments to figure out. Their tones were argumentative and harsh. She had never heard either one of them speak to each other this way. It was jarring.
“…understand… cannot give her the Old City… Humans are all…”
“…duty to…” Voso’s answers were hard to understand unless he drifted into Draquun.
“But we must do something, Voso… impossible…”
“…she will not leave. You have still lied. By…”
“…of her parents? Do you think… for our planet? Don’t be a fool! … … have a Human as a wife…”
“…at all…”
“…betray her before she manages to… cannot be…”
“…what will she…”
“…not… duty to care… above all… to the people of Old Celox. You know that to be true. I can feel it in my bones. The Human will… she suspects nothing… decision, and then we shall proceed…”
“I can’t… become of…”
Mina’s heart sank as she listened to their conversation. She didn’t have tremendous faith in her Draquun, and she didn’t understand everything they were saying, she knew that.
But she understood enough of what she had heard to get a bad feeling about it all. It was just enough to poison her sentiments, just enough to snap her back into reality.
This was all a game, and she had lost. It was true that they seemed to be arguing, but they were arguing about her, and the reasons were obvious: she had been tricked.
She backed away, suddenly sick to her heart. Again, again this was happening! She had fallen for someone, given her feelings over to them, even though she knew better than that. And now, here she was again. Heartsick, foolish, and she had lost everything.
She retraced her steps and began to run when she reached the corridors of the old building. She started to cry, and her face was damp when she reached the end of a corridor that was all glass window and looked out on the city of Old Celox.
Her tears dried up, and her walls reconstructed themselves almost as quickly.
Okay, she thought. Okay. Reality check.
There was no way to win this game. It had been rigged from the very beginning. She didn’t know why Mozok and Voso had taken it to such extremes, why they had led her on in these final days and weeks, but it hardly mattered now. It was clear from their conversation and from the law, that she could never really get this contract.
She put a hand to her head, almost wanting to slap herself for being so stupid. Mozok had explained this much to her long before she had become embroiled in this wild sexual affair, before she had let herself… fall in love with them.
